What is going on with lay theology?

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So, yesterday i received and e-mail warning of the coming anti-christ in the person of Obama. The e-mail said, "we know from the bible that the anti-christ will be roughly 40 yrs old and of Muslim decent." I don't think that's the bible, try more like Tim Lahaye and the left behind series or perhaps some of the great preachers of our day like John Hagee. Look, first of all, Islam came into existence some five hundred years after the Revelation was written, and second, no where(at least that I've seen) is the anti-christ's age given, and even if it were, taking numerology in apocalyptic literature literally is more often than not naive and dangerous. This is simply another example of pour exegesis and theology seeping down to the masses, who then, pardon the pun, take it for gospel. The more i contemplate Christianity, the story of Jesus, His Kingdom, and His people, the more I'm convinced of the centrality of eschatology. All our beliefs, and all our actions are to be because of the coming King. I will be the first to admit that eschatology(and by this i don't mean finding out the specific locations and happenings of the end time like our dispensational friends) is one of the most difficult of studies, but considering that who, where, what we shall be and see grounds much of the New Testaments call to Christ-likeness, i think its time to stop getting our doctrines from the fiction section. What we believe will shape who we are.